Shoreline Equity Partners, a private equity firm with a disciplined and collaborative approach to investing in U.S. lower middle market companies, announced its launch. Shoreline’s investment philosophy is focused on being an ideal partner to management teams, legacy-focused sellers, and intermediaries. The Firm is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida and has a particular interest in developing close partnerships with companies, intermediaries, executives, and other professionals in the Southeastern U.S. A meaningful portion of the Firm’s profits will be contributed to philanthropic initiatives.

Shoreline was founded by Michael Hand and Peter Franz, who have spent a substantial portion of their careers investing in lower middle market companies. Michael has over 15 years of experience originating, analyzing, negotiating, monitoring, and exiting private equity investments. Prior to founding Shoreline, he co-founded and co-led PNC Riverarch Capital, the PNC Financial Services Group’s on-balance sheet private equity strategy. Peter has over 20 years of partner-level private equity experience. Prior to founding Shoreline, he worked at Florida Capital Partners as Co-Managing Partner. Michael and Peter have had a longstanding relationship and have successfully evaluated, invested in, and managed several lower middle market portfolio companies alongside one another while at their respective prior firms. They will be joined by Ian Garland and Zachary Mittelmark, both of whom previously worked with Michael at PNC Riverarch Capital.

Shoreline will seek to lead equity investments of up to $100 million per transaction in support of buyouts, recapitalizations, and corporate divestitures. Targeted businesses are expected to have enterprise values ranging from $25 million to $250 million and EBITDA of $5 million to $25 million. The Firm intends to actively partner with management teams of non-capital-intensive businesses within the specialized manufacturing, value-added distribution, and business and industrial services sectors.

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